September 2010

09/30/2010

The other day my friend Tami and I each spent the afternoon working on some school work and planned to meet up at 6 when our brains couldn't take it anymore. I had purchased some ingredients that I had intended on using for a salad but as my hunger grew more vociferous, I decided to make a pasta sauce instead. I had a package of pepperoncino infused linguini that I'd bought at KaDeWe during my April trip to Berlin. I figured that now would be as good a time as any to finally eat them. I decided to make make a butter sauce for the pasta rather than a tomato based one and I had clementines, dates, onions, and spices before me from which to choose. Citrus, specifically oranges, clementines and the like, go well with fennel. Alas I had no fennel but I did have fennel seed. I melted the butter in a sauce pan over very low heat and added my onions and spices while the butter was still hard so that they would sweat rather than sizzle. With the onions cut very thinly they transformed into a second kind of noodle. I added the date last and allowed them to simmer long enough in the pan juices to take on the other flavours without loosing their crunch. After boiling the pasta I tossed it with olive oil to keep from sticking and some mint for freshness. Having originally intended to make a salad, I had quite a lot of chopped endive which I threw on top of the pasta at the last minute for some bitterness and yet another texture.

Tami is a vegetarian who seldom eats pasta. To her credit, she has a much better balanced diet than may of the vegetarian I know who mostly subsist off of carbohydrates. Rather than the typical spaghetti in red sauce, this pasta had a plethora of ingredients, flavours and textures that may have gone a long way in convincing her that when pasta is well prepared it need not be heavy and boring. While it's not the quickest meal to make, it only took half an hour to prepare and the results were delightful. Try it at home. Enjoy.

Ingredients:

25 grams of butter

1 medium Spanish onion, sliced thinly radially

2 small thai red chillies, slit open

1/4 tsp of coriander sees

1/4 tsp of cumin seeds

1 tsp of fennel seeds

the juice of two large clementines

6 dates, halved, pitted then sliced thinly on a diagonal

1 large endive, sliced and the discs from the core discarded

1 tbls green peppercorns, crushed the the back of a knife

1 package of pepperoncino infused linguini

2 tbls of extra virgin olive oil

the leaves of 10 sprigs of mint, washed and dried

salt to taste

Directions:

Place the butter in a sauce pan in one large chunk and heat on the lowest possible setting. Move the butter around the pan to coat it and add the onions, chillies and spices to the pan while the butter is still melting. Break apart the onions with a silicon spatula and mix everything evenly in the pan. Allow to sweat for about five minutes. Add the clementine juice, raise the heat ever so slightly and bring to a simmer. Allow to simmer for 10 minutes then add the dates. If the dates are not submerged, add 1/3 cup of water to the pan. Allow to simmer gently while you prepare the pasta.

Boil and ample amount of water in a large pot, when it comes to a rolling bowl, add 1 tsp of salt. Boil the pasta according to the directions on the package, strain immediately when ready. Return to the pot and toss with olive oil and mint leaves and a bit of salt. Turn off the heat on the sauce. Plate the pasta and then pour over the sauce. Sprinkle atop as much green pepper as you desire then add the endive. Serve immediately. B'Teavon!

09/26/2010

Last week I was hit with a terrible craving for Indian and for meat. I am sick of chicken and because stewing is so central to most Indian cuisines, the cheaper cuts of beef matched perfectly with my budget and desired dish. If you've got a kitchen well stocked with spices, this meal doesn't require a terrible number of purchases at the market either. I called Leemor around 2 PM and asked if she'd be amenable to joining me later. We both agreed that a later hour would best accommodate us. I went to the Shuk, got everything necessary and managed to put in a few more hours on my paper before preparing the meal.

While at the Shuk I conversed with many of my favourite merchants. Because "Mizrah Ma'arav/East West" is the primary retailer of exotic products in the Shuk, my frequent visits have led me to develop a friendship with the owner of the franchise, Rafi. Prior to entering his store I was examining some tomatoes at a stall directly outside of it. After having decided that a can of Italian tomatoes would be more appropriate for my dish, the merchant at the stall screamed obscenities at me for not buying his tomatoes up until the moment I entered Mizrah Ma'arav. Rafi greeted me at the door and asked me what the "balagan" (crudely translated as "brouhaha") was all about and I explained the situation. He led me to the cans of Italian tomatoes on the shelf and then left the store to chastise the tomato merchant who had berated me. Rafi returned just as I was paying and assured me that it wouldn't happen again. I thanked him and then to my delight, as I exited the store, the tomato merchant approached me, put his hand on my shoulder and simply nodded. In the macho culture that is so pervasive at the Shuk, that was about as good of an apology as I could have hoped for.

I returned home, did some work, and then set my mind to the task at hand. It is still extremely hot in Israel and so I made sure to do ALL of my prep work before turning on the oven or any burners. I decided on a straightforward meal: curry, rice and puréed squash. Colour is always a consideration in the food that I make and sometimes the results adequately reflect my desires as was the case that day. Stews can be left largely unattended so after the initial cooking, I was able to return to my air-conditioned bedroom.

After an hour, I returned to the kitchen to prepare the squash and rice. Some teenage boys were constructing a Sukkah outside my door with no expertise and a lot of yelling. I asked them several times to respect the neighbourhood's desire for quiet and was met with about 30 seconds of respite before the cacophony resumed. In my frustatration I made one mistake in the preparation of this meal - I forgot to wash the rice. Basmati rice is heavy in starches and if they're not washed away while the rice is uncooked, they make the rice stick together. When preparing this meal, simply remember to wash the rice several times until the water runs clear before cooking it. Otherwise, the flavours were on point and the dishes were hot but not overwhelmingly so.

Leemore joined me at 9 and again attempted to reason with the teenagers with the diplomacy of my first attempt. She was no more successful than I so we turned our attentions to the food. We had a lovely meal with great conversation and afterward we left a clean kitchen! Food is best when enjoyed in good company.

Ingredients:

For the beef stew

1.5 lbs chuck, large dice, exterior fat trimmed and reserved

1 tsp of asafoetida

6 strands of saffron

1 tbls of ghee

1 tsp of mustard seeds

1/8 tsp of fenugreek seeds

1/2 tsp of coriander seeds

1 onion, purée (in a blender or with an immersion blender)

3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 14 oz/425ml can of peeled Italian tomatoes

5 Thai red chillies, seeded

1" inch of ginger peeled and crushed with the back of a knife

1 tbls of jaggery (or brown sugar if you don't have any)

the heads of 7 cloves, pinched between your fingers

1/4 tsp of ground cinnamon

2 curry leaves

For the squash

1 small butternut squash, sliced in half length-wise and seeded

Chilli infused olive oil to cover

3" of ginger, peeled and grated (ideally on a Japanese ginger grater, don't discard the juices)

1/2 tsp garam masala

S+P to taste

For the rice

1 tbls vegetable oil

1 cup basmati rice

10-12 curry leaves

1/2 cup of lime juice

1.5 cups boiling water

a pinch of salt

Directions:

Heat a Dutch oven over medium and render out about 3 tbls of fat from the trimming of the beef. Brown the beef (in batches if necessary) then remove to a plate.

Combine the asafoetida and safron with 1.5 cups boiling water and allow to infuse. Combine the canned tomatoes (with the juices from the can), the ginger and chillies in a high rimmed bowl and purée with an immersion blender.

Melt the ghee in the Dutch oven and add the mustard, fenugreek and coriander seeds. Once the mustard seeds begin to pop, add the puréed onion. Sautée for about 7 minutes or until the onion browned, stirring intermittently. Add the cloves, garlic and jaggery and sautée until the jaggery has dissolved and has begun to caramelise. Add the puréed tomatoes and cinnamon and bring to a simmer. Once at simmer, add the water with the asafoetida and saffron. Return the meat to the pot and juices that may have escaped while it was resting on the plate. Make sure all of the meat is submerged (if not, add a little water). Cover and turn down the heat all the way down (if you're using an electric stove top then set at 2, not 1). Allow to simmer covered for 2 hours, stirring occasionally to keep from burning (about once every half hour).

Pre-heat the oven to 205C/400F. Coat the flesh side of the butternut squash with the chilli infused olive oil, sprinkle on some salt then lay flesh side down in a baking dish. Roast in the oven for 45 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool. Transfer the squash to plate or cutting board and peel away the skin. Transfer the flesh of the squash to blender of high rimmed bowl, add all other ingredients and purée well.

Heat a sauce pan over medium with the vegetable oil. Add the dry rice and curry leaves and sautée for 3-4 minutes. Add the lime juice and boiling water, bring to a simmer, cover and allow to cook for 20 minutes. Remove the cover and serve immediately.

09/25/2010

Last week I had the pleasure of welcoming a friend from university to Tel Aviv. After a year of commuting from Jerusalem, Michal moved to Tel Aviv and was finally able to come over for dinner. She requested Asian food, and with my upcoming trip to Southeast Asia in mind, I decided to consult my Thai and Vietnamese cookbooks for some inspiration. The first dish that appealed to me was a Vietnamese cucumber and tomato salad. Cucumber and tomato salad (usually called "chopped salad" in Hebrew) is a staple of Israeli cuisine, and is normally simply dressed with olive oil, salt and pepper. This Vietnamese version was far less simple. Rather than dicing the cucumbers and tomatoes, the recipe called for slices that were top be arranged on the plate and then covered in a vinegar based dressing that despite its many ingredients, did more to enhance the flavour of the cucumbers and tomatoes than to disguise them. That dressing was a combination of minced garlic and shallots in vinegar and several other ingredients that I left to macerate for a few hours before pouring it atop the salad.

Both in the Vietnamese and Thai cookbooks, many of the recipes I encountered were stir fries. Alas, I do not own a wok and therefore decided to incorporate the flavours and ingredients present with techniques more appropriate for my equipment. Rather than cook the chicken breast in with the vegetables that were meant to be stir fried, I sautéed the vegetables and then prepared the chicken breast separately, sliced it and proceeded to compile all the components on the plate together. Furthermore, both cuisines rely heavily on fish sauce which is one ingredient for which I have yet to acquire a taste. I substituted the fish sauce for dark Japanese soy sauce and the result was certainly pleasing. I made a cilantro emulsion, entirely of my own design, to accompany the chicken, vegetables and rice. These recipes are not terribly time consuming, relatively simple to prepare and most of all scrumptious. While I pride myself on my ingenuity in the kitchen, at times it is refreshing and inspiring to use some one else's recipes. The recipes presented here are an adaptation from "True Thai" by Viktor Sodsook and "Culinary Vietnam" by Daniel Hoyer. Serve with steamed jasmine rice and your favourite cilantro sauce. Enjoy.

Ingredients:

1 head of garlic peeled (needed for both)

For main course

1 boneless, skinless chicken breast, trimmed and breastbone removed

1 Spanish onion, sliced radially

3 tbls veg oil

8 Thai chillies, sliced into rings (with the seeds)

1/2" galagal, minced

2 tbls Japanese dark soy sauce

1 tbls sugar

1 tbls rice wine vinegar

1 tbls sweet Thai soy sauce

the leaves of one bunch of mint, washed and dried

For the salad

6 Israeli cucumbers, cut into 1/4" thick rings

3 large roma tomatoes, cut into 1/4" thick rings

3 tbls rice vinegar

2 tbls lime juice

2 tbls sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 tbls minced shallots

1 red Thai chilli, sliced into thin rings (with the seeds)

Directions:

Make a paste out of the head of garlic, either in a mortar and pestle or with an immersion blender in a high rimmed bowl.

Combine the rice vinegar, lime juice, sugar, salt, shallots and chillies and 1/3 of the garlic paste and allow to macerate while you prepare the rest of the meal.

Pre-heat oven to 375F/190C.

Heat 2 tbls of vegetable oil in a sautée pan over medium. When hot, add the onions. Sautée for for 8 minutes, then add the garlic. As soon as the garlic has browned, add the chillies and galangal and mix in well. Stir in the sugar and once its mixed in immediately add the rice vinegar. After about 30 seconds, add the Japanese and Thai soy sauces, mix in and allow to reduce slightly. Cover and keep warm.

Heat the remaining oil in a cast iron skillet. S+P each chicken breast and then pan fry for about 3 minutes on either side. Place the skillet in the oven for 7 minutes. Remove and allow to rest for 3 minutes.

Re-heat the sautéed onions slightly, toss with the mint and turn off the heat. Return cover.

Slice the chicken and plate with jasmine rice and the sautéed onions.

Compose the cucumber and tomatoes on a platter and then pour atop the dressing evenly. Allow to sit for a minute or two before serving. B'Teavon!

09/14/2010

Before leaving for my month long sojourn in North America, Ilan and I got together to prepare some limes for preservation - a process that takes six weeks. Having done so several days before I left, I need wait little time after coming home taste the preserved limes and incorporate them into my dishes. Although I had originally intended to do this in order to have limes in the off season, preserved limes have little in common with the flavour of the fresh variety. Ilan came over to taste the fruits of our endeavour and both of us were shocked and delighted at the truly exceptional and unexpected flavour we encountered. The limes had taken on a slightly gelatinous texture and there taste lied somewhere between a pickled cucumber and an olive. This is quite logical as cucumbers are normally pickled in vinegar, a highly acidic substance, and olives are normally pickled in salt. Having preserved our highly acidic limes by stuffing them with salt, we created a substance that was doubly pickled. Preserved lemons are a staple of Moroccan cuisine and can be bought jarred at speciality stores. I decided that the most fitting first use of my newly concocted ingredient would be to put them in a tagine.

The results can only be described as intense. The combination of the limes with tomatoes made the overall level of acidity quite high. I tried to mitigate this by introducing potatoes into the mix but that wasn't sufficient in and of itself. The acidity of the dish was eventually muted when I mashed the cooked potatoes into the dish's juices after plating. Having prepared to chicken legs and being the only diner, I reheated the remainders of the dish the next day and this time pulled all of the meat off the bone and mashed the whole thing together. I didn't photograph that stage, but you can get the idea. Had I devoted more time to this meal, I would have added some plain white rice to absorb the acidic juices without having to mash all of the potatoes. Nonetheless, the flavours were excellent and with a little tweaking this could become a perfect dish. Enjoy.

Ingredients:

1/2 white onion, peeled and cut into 4

1" of ginger, peeled

2 thai red bird chillies, 1 seeded, the other left in tact

2 large cloves of garlic

2-3 small pieces of Vietnamese cinnamon

1 tbls walnut oil

7 roma tomatoes, halved lengthwise

1 large yukon cold potato, diced into 1/2" cubes

1 preserved lime, quartered and then sliced thinly

1/4 cup of dill + more for garnish

2 chicken legs

S+P to taste (only for the chicken, the preserved limes will ensure that the rest of dish is salt enough)

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 205C/400F.

Combine onion, garlic, chillies, ginger and cinnamon in a high rimmed bowl and purée with an immersion blender until perfectly smooth. Add the walnut and purée further. Add one of the roma tomatoes to the mix and purée again. Pour this mixture into the bottom of the tagine and pile on all the other ingredients making sure that they are evenly spread. Salt your chicken and place it atop the vegetables. Place the lid on the tagine and leave in the oven for one hour.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool with the lid on for about 10 minutes. Remove the lid and then remove the skin from the chicken, and serve.

Although I neither attended nor prepared a large meal for Rosh HaShana, I decided to make something light but satisfying that was representative of the season and the holiday. At the end of the summer we have the most beautiful tomatoes in Israel, and I was pining for some bruschetta. Traditionally on Rosh HaShanah, we dip apples in honey to commemorate the sweetness of the new coming year. While I forewent the honey, I decided to incorporate apples into my bruschetta. I combined the apples with the usual ingredients for a bruschetta - tomatoes, shallots, basil, olive oil and balsamic vinegar. To give it an extra kick I used chilli infused olive oil and added some mint for freshness. Rather than adding minced garlic to the mix, I used the typical Italian technique of scraping the toast with garlic to impart its intense raw flavour. Unfortunately the apples that looked best were Gala apples and they were somewhat mealier than the Pink Ladies that I would have preferred. Try to make this recipe with a hard apple like Pink Lady or McIntosh. It's a simple thing to prepare and quite delicious. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

1 ciabatta, sliced diagonally into 1/4" thick pieces

1 large clove of garlic

1 large gala apple, cored and 1/4" dice

3 roma tomatoes, cored and 1/4" dice

1 shallot, finely chopped

10 large basil leaves, finely chopped

10 mint leaves, finely chopped

1 tbls of chilli infused olive oil

2 tsp of high quality balsamic vinegar

S+P to taste

Directions:

Pre-heat the oven to 190C/375F. Toast the bread in the oven for 10 minutes. Remove and allow to cool. Turn off the oven. Once cool, scrape one side of each slice of toast with the garlic and set aside.

Combine all other ingredients in a bowl and toss well ensuring that everything is evenly coated. Place atop the toast and serve. B'Teavon!

09/06/2010

After having made a delicious Thai meal a few nights ago, I thought that I ought to celebrate the Shuk for the best produce in season, which at present are yellow dates (less ripe than brown dates with a great crunch), clementines, limes (which are nearing the end of their season here), purslane and pomegranates (as well as guava, mangoes and figs). I wanted to make two chicken legs suffice for three so I decided to braise them and pull the meat. The only parameters given for the meal were "it should be light", so light it was.

Despite having demanded that dinner be served promptly at 8:15, my guests arrive 30 minutes late. I expected as much so that 8:45 was exactly when dinner was ready. While finishing the final touches, I invited my guests to eat some raw dates that had not made it into the salad. Rebecca was immediately enamoured of them but Kassandra thought they tasted like chalk. Rebecca and I insisted that she try some more and eventually she came to enjoy the taste and deal with the texture. I paired the dates with purslane and celery. Celery is not considered to be in season at present but in Israel that means it's picked early. For many fruits and vegetables that leaves the consumer with a hard under ripe peach or an avocado that is inedible, but the "out of season" celery simply has a lower water content and is therefore more flavourful than the stuff that was available a few months ago. Pomegranate are not yet at their peak, but the one I added to the salad nonetheless gave it excellent flavour and tartness.

All in all, my guests and I were both satisfied with the meal. In order to satisfy the request for lightness I decided to use dehydrated bread as my starch rather than rice or potatoes as it was both light and an excellent conduit for the sauce that came with the chicken. If you have all the ingredients, it's incredible simple to make. Enjoy!

1 ciabatta, most of the crust trimmed off and then sliced thinly width-wise

Directions:

Heat the peanut and mustard oil in a dutch oven over medium, once hot, add the coriander seeds. After 3 minutes add the fennel seeds and lower to medium-low. As soon as the seeds turn black, add the chicken. Allow to brown, about 3-4 minutes on each side, then add the ginger, garlic and clementine and lime juices. Add about 1 tbls of salt. Bring to a simmer and place the lid on the dutch oven. Lower the had slightly below medium-low and allow to simmer for 1 hour with the lid on, turning the chicken over half way. Remove the lid and raise the heat just slightly so that it's at medium-low. Allow to reduce for another half an hour. Take two forks and pull the meat of the bone but make sure that it remains in the liquid otherwise it will dry out. Taste and all more S+P to taste.

Pre-heat the oven to 100C/212F. Leave the sliced bread in their for exactly 12 minutes so that it's perfectly dehydrated but not browned. Combine all the ingredients on the plate with the meat over the dehydrated bread to allow it to soak up all of the delicious juices.

09/01/2010

Sunday morning I arrived back in Tel Aviv with a suitcase worth of ingredients brought back from New York. Some of those ingredients were fresh and I was faced with using them immediately or freezing them for later usage. The Kaffir limes I purchased were holding up but some of the Kaffir lime leaves were turning brown so I picked out some green ones and was intent to use them for the first dinner I made after having returned.

My month long adventure in North America was packed with culinary delights, some prepared by me and some by others. Alas, so much time has elapsed that I cannot give accurate recipes for them all and so I thought I start my first post in a while with the most recent dishes for which I can remember the recipes. Lots of pictures and descriptions of the other dishes I ate over the past month are coming up, but first a delicious meatless meal inspired by thriftiness and some vegetarian friends.

I perused the Shuk for the first time in a month and discovered a number of lovely ingredients which are sure to appear in my next meal. Monday night, however, I stuck with the Thai eggplant and green mangoes now in season and on offer at the Asian vegetable stand in the Shuk. The problem I often encounter in vegetarian meals is that they are either too light and dissatisfying or made to heavy with an abundance of legumes and grains. I looked for a balance. Furthermore, it's about 1000 degrees in my kitchen in the summer and it is my goal for the rest of the season (which in Israel lasts until mid-October) to reduce the use of my oven and make meals that require less heating. For that reason, I only used the burners for an hour.

I wanted my eggplant and noodle dish to come out as white as possible to best contrast the herbs with which I topped it. I steeped a number of spices and aromatics in coconut milk for 45 minutes allowing it to reduce slightly and thicken, then strained it, returned it to the pot and cooked my eggplant in it. I boiled some "rice spaghetti" as the packaging announced, strained the spaghetti and combine it with the eggplant and coconut milk and topped it with some cilantro, mint and Japanese chilli rings which are more aesthetic than the more ubiquitous flakes.

Having devoted my hour of burner usage to the noodle dish, I decided that the accompaniment should be entirely raw. I shaved the green mango on a wide gauge on a grater and combined it with red onion and pomegranate, an item not present when I last visited the Shuk in July. Because the salad was so simple, I made a rather complex avocado dressing. Often the avocado emulsions I make serve better as a purée for they come out so thick, so I thinned this one with water to make it more of a dressing. The combination of Thai and Japanese flavours that used was delectable and I highly recommend you try it if you've got the ingredients at home.

Since I've been seriously jetlagged, I set the dinner for 9 and at 9:30 on the dot Tami and Dan showed up and all that was left to do was to make the noodles. May, who had planned on just stopping by to say hello, arrived just as the food was ready and all of sat down to a scrumptious meal. Enjoy.

Ingredients:

For the noodles

1 large can of coconut milk

2" of galangal, crushed with the back of a knife and lightly chopped

1 medium clove of garlic, sliced thinly

1 stalk of lemon grass, trimmed and well bruised

1/2 kaffir lime

4 kaffir lime leaves, bruised

1 tbls of coriander seeds

5 white cardamon pods

2 Thai eggplant, sliced into 1/4" thick discs

150g dry rice noodles

Salt to taste, if you wish, add white pepper

mint leaves, cilantro and chilli rings/flaked to garnish

For the salad

2 green mangoes, peeled and shaved down to the pit on a coarse grater

1 red onion, sliced radially (if you like less, use half)

the seeds of 1/2 pomegranate

1 avocado

1/2 tsp of green curry paste

1" inch ginger, peeled and crushed with the back of a knife

1 small clove of garlic

1 green thai bird chilli

the zest of one Kaffir lime

4 mint leaves

3 sprigs of cilantro

2 tbls of yuzu juice

1 tbls of rice vinegar

2-3 tbls of water

S+P to taste

Directions:

Combine all ingredients for the noodles except the eggplant and the noodles in a sauce pan and bring to a simmer. Allow to reduce over medium-low heat for 30 minutes, then cover for an additional 15. Strain the coconut milk discarding the solid contents and reserving the liquid. Add salt to taste. Return to the sauce pan and bring to a simmer again over medium heat while covered. As soon as it's simmering, enter the eggplant into the sauce pan making sure that all the pieces are coated in the coconut milk, place the cover on and return the lid, allow to simmer for 15 minutes.

Boil water and follow the directions for your rice noodles on the package as they differ with size and brand. Strain the noodles after cooking and then pour in the pot with the coconut milk, combine, turn off the heat and return the lid. Plate when ready to eat and top with mint, cilantro and chilli rings.

Combine the first three ingredients for the salad in a bowl and mix well. Combine all other ingredients, save the water, in a high rimmed bowl and purée thoroughly with an immersion blender. Add 1 tbls of water at a time until you've reached the desired consistency (thin enough to pour over a salad) - you may use more or less than the suggested quantity here. Plate the salad and top with dressing.